Scientists from APC are among the researchers worldwide honored with the 2025 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, awarded to the ATLAS Collaboration at CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) alongside its sister experiments ALICE, CMS and LHCb [1].
ATLAS is one of the largest and most complex scientific instruments ever built. As a general-purpose particle detector measuring over 40 metres in length and around 25 metres in height, it was designed to investigate the fundamental building blocks of matter and the forces governing our universe. Its cutting-edge systems track particles produced in particle collisions at unprecedented energies, enabling discoveries like the Higgs boson and searches for new physics beyond the Standard Model.
The Breakthrough Prize specifically highlights the ATLAS Collaboration’s significant contributions to particle physics, including detailed measurements of Higgs boson properties, studies of rare processes and matter-antimatter asymmetry, and the exploration of nature under the most extreme conditions.
“The Breakthrough Prize is a testament to the dedication and ingenuity of the ATLAS Collaboration and our colleagues across the LHC experiments,” said ATLAS Spokesperson Stephane Willocq. "This prize recognises the collective vision and monumental effort of thousands of ATLAS collaborators worldwide.”
“I am extremely proud to see the extraordinary accomplishments of the LHC collaborations honoured with this prestigious Prize,” said Fabiola Gianotti, Director-General of CERN. “It is a beautiful recognition of the collective efforts, dedication, competence and hard work of thousands of people from all over the world who contribute daily to pushing the boundaries of human knowledge.”
Since the beginning of ATLAS data taking in 2009, and after they created an ATLAS team at APC [2] in 2021, APC Scientists have been at the forefront of ATLAS research, contributing to
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operation and simulation of the ATLAS inner detector, critical for reconstruction and measurement of charged particle tracks and interaction vertices
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calibrations of algorithms for reconstruction or identification of photons, b-jets and leptons
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development of analysis techniques enabling the measurement of Higgs boson properties in multiple single- and double-Higgs final states
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leadership in performance and analysis working subgroups and collaboration committees, shaping the experiment's scientific direction
Five PhD theses and two post-doctoral researchers at APC have contributed in the past years to these projects.
"The successes of Run 2 showcase the ingenuity of the ATLAS Collaboration — not only in collecting data with a detector of outstanding precision, but also in our relentless drive to improve our understanding of it," said Andreas Hoecker, former ATLAS Spokesperson.
While the ATLAS Collaboration celebrates the recognition of the Breakthrough Prize, its focus remains firmly on the future. The third operation period of the LHC is currently underway and preparations for the High-Luminosity LHC upgrade are advancing rapidly. APC's team is deeply involved in preparing ATLAS for its next chapter. They are contributing to the development of the simulation and software infrastructure of the ATLAS Inner Tracker (ITk) for the High-Luminosity LHC, which will increase collision rates tenfold when it begins operation in 2030.
“We are now preparing the ATLAS detectors of the future — designed to harness these unprecedented data and further push our understanding of the universe’s fundamental building blocks,” concludes Willocq.
Equipe ATLAS-APC:
Gregorio Bernardi, Marco Bomben, Alexis Maloizel, Giovanni Marchiori
Former PhD students and post-doctoral researchers: Romain Bouquet, Giulia Di Gregorio, Ang Li, Tong Li, Keerthi Nakkalil, Qiuping Shen, Yulei Zhang.
Contact: Giovanni Marchiori (responsable du groupe ATLAS APC)
[2] https://apc.u-paris.fr/APC_CS/fr/higgs-atlasfcc
Members of the APC ATLAS team at the “biennale” of APC laboratory in June 2024
Services/Groupes:
- ATLAS